Page 31 of Taming the Beasts (Crooked Point #3)

Monday

Zoey

I was grateful that it was finally Monday and that the guys were going back to work today. The bank was closed on Sundays and the energy in the house hadn’t been great. Even with the distraction of some great football games.

It didn’t matter how optimistic I tried to be. They didn’t believe me. And I wasn’t sure I believed myself either. Especially as more hours ticked by.

But today was a new day and I’d gone all out this morning.

I’d made a whole breakfast spread for them.

There were chocolate chip pancakes, blueberry pancakes, and plain ones to choose them.

Plus heaps of scrambled eggs, bacon, and fresh fruit.

It had taken me some time but I’d finally figured out how to use their fancy coffeemaker too.

“Good morning,” I said in as cheery of a voice as possible as the twins walked into the kitchen.

“This looks amazing,” Huxley said. His words were positive. His tone wasn’t.

And Ace didn’t say anything at all.

When Otto walked into the kitchen he smiled at me. But his smile didn’t quite reach his eyes.

If even Otto was sad, this was a disaster .

Titan walked into the kitchen. He looked at all the food and then grabbed a box of cereal from the pantry.

I quickly made him a plate, grabbed the milk carton mid-pour over his cereal, and handed him the plate. “For you.”

He raised his eyebrow at me.

I wasn’t sure why. I’d been very nice to him since Saturday. It was hard to play games when life suddenly felt so heavy. If that meant he’d never like me, fine. I wanted to be able to take care of him when he was sad. If he didn’t like it, he could go screw himself.

“Is this going to end up on my head?” he asked. He stared at the food like he was trying to decide if it would be a good hat.

I laughed. “Is that where you want it?”

He just stared at me.

“Well, I’m not opposed to licking syrup off your face.” I lifted the container. “Do you want some?”

“I don’t like sweet things, doll.”

That was just a lie. I’d made cookies yesterday and he’d eaten a few. After he saw everyone else eat them. He’d probably been worried they were poisoned.

“No sweets,” I said instead of calling him out. “One second.” I switched out his chocolate chip pancakes for plain ones. “There you go, big boy.”

He looked very confused.

Honestly I wasn’t sure why I’d called him that either. This whole thing was awkward. Did he want me to act more sour? I was trying to be freaking nice, damn it! “Would you please just sit your ass down and eat the food I spent all morning making? Jerk,” I added under my breath .

Titan didn’t move. “I’ll actually take the chocolate chip pancakes.”

Was he serious right now? It was like he was purposefully pushing my buttons. Wait. Was he? I stared up at the scowl on his face. Was this his version of flirting? Because it was very menacing. “No,” I said firmly. “They’re chocolate. And you literally just said you don’t like sweet things.”

“I like some sweet things okay.”

Were the other guys as confused about this as I was? “Fine. Whatever.” I put one chocolate chip pancake on top of his plain ones.

“Thank you. I guess.” He turned and walked away.

Seriously...what the hell? There was no winning with him.

Otto finally laughed as he slid up next to me at the stove. “I think he was saying that he prefers you being sour. Pretty sure you just freaked him out.”

I laughed. But maybe Otto had a point. Had Titan been enjoying our fiery banter as much as I’d been? Because it was a lot more fun to bicker with him than whatever the hell that was. “I was trying to be nice.”

“Titan doesn’t really do nice.”

Huh. “Noted.”

Bennett was quiet as he filled his plate with food.

I was really starting to worry about him. I was usually good at small talk, but there was no amount of small talk that would help this situation. Hopefully the guys would have a great day of work today and get their minds off their missing friend.

Emma texted me as I closed the front door behind them. “Are you still coming over? Or are the guys staying home today? ”

“I’m on my way,” I texted back. I needed a day out. Even if it involved painting.

A few minutes later I was knocking on Emma’s door. I loved how close our houses were to each other.

Emma opened the door. “I can’t believe their friend is missing. Do you really think it might have something to do with the coin?”

I’d caught her up via text on Saturday. But I hadn’t gotten to talk to her about all this in person. “I have no idea. It seems like too much of a coincidence though, right? The very last text Ray sent was about the coin. The guys really seem to think he’s dead.”

“That’s awful. But I don’t understand. All he had was information. It wasn’t like someone attacked him to steal the coin. And if he was attacked or killed...wouldn’t they be able to find his body somewhere?”

I shuddered. “I really just don’t even want to think about it anymore. What can I help you with in here?” I pushed my sleeves up my arms as I looked around the room. The last time I’d been here, there hadn’t been any furniture. But the living room was fully decorated and freshly painted.

“About that. There’s not too much left to do. Everything has already been painted.”

“Weren’t you redoing the kitchen and bathrooms too? I could help with that. With instruction.” I had no idea how to renovate anything. My expertise was very specialized and very much not this.

“Yeah. But that’s pretty much done too.”

“What?” I walked through the living room and into the kitchen. I stared at the new quartz countertops and cabinetry. I looked down at the new tiled floor. “I’m so confused. This is all new, isn’t it? How? ”

“Apparently there are lots of perks to dating a vampire who doesn’t sleep. Callum’s been working on everything non-stop so we can move in right after the wedding.”

“Even without sleep this is a ton of work.” I ran my hand along the beautiful veined countertop.

“I think the super vampire speed came in handy too. I literally only had to paint two rooms.”

I laughed. “That’s amazing. I thought we’d be working on this all day.”

“Well, when we made the plans originally, I did think we needed help. Callum really surprised me.”

I sat down at the kitchen island and lifted an apple out of the fruit bowl. “Is everything already fully stocked too?”

She nodded.

Callum was a gem. I placed the apple back down. “Well what about decorations?”

I was actually going to go through a bunch of Callum’s things with him. To decide what is okay to put up and what seems way too suspicious of him being ancient.”

I laughed. “Luckily being filthy rich lets you have some rare old pieces.”

“Very true. A few portraits of him from centuries ago definitely don’t work though. No matter how handsome he is in them.”

“Fair.”

“But we’re going to do all that later. Right now I just want to figure out what is going on with this missing person.”

I shrugged. “I don’t have any other info.”

“So he disappeared sometime Friday night? ”

“Yeah. Bennett last heard from Ray early Saturday morning. Around 1 am our time.”

“What did the text say exactly?”

“I didn’t see it. But it was something along the lines of how he knew all about the coin. And he wanted to talk to him on the phone about it during lunch. He must have known a lot, or he would have just texted the info, right?”

“Or maybe what he knew was bad.”

I pressed my lips together. Yeah, I’d thought of that too. “But even bad news can be sent via text.”

“It’s usually better etiquette to not send negative things via text though, right?”

“I guess.”

We were both quiet for a moment.

“It was also possible that he didn’t want there to be any written evidence,” I said.

“Why?”

“Maybe someone was tailing him or something? Watching his every move?”

Emma shuddered. “Well that’s not creepy at all.”

“It makes sense though. Maybe he was already scared of someone. And then that someone found out that he knew some juicy coin information and killed him over it.”

“But who else wants the coin other than us?”

“Well, we know there are more vampires out there.”

Emma shook her head. “Why do we always need to blame vampires for everything? Maybe there are more werecats out there and they wanted information about the coin.”

“Sure,” I said. But we hadn’t heard about more werecats. We had heard about more vampires. “Or any supernatural creature, really. Kebe said it was a blanket cure.”

“Have you asked your guys if they know about any other supernatural creatures?”

I shook my head. “No. Have you asked Callum?”

“No. I’m not sure I even want to know.”

“Same.” Vampires and werecats seemed like enough for one town. I sighed. “I just wish we knew what happened. The guys need some kind of closure. It’s really tearing them up.”

“I’m so sorry. And the last thing they needed was more bad news after you told them about Grudge.”

Eek. “I didn’t tell them about Grudge.”

“Zoey!”

“Emma! How could I have possibly brought up Grudge after Bennett told me one of his good friends went mysteriously missing? It would have been entirely inappropriate.”

“I guess. So I’m assuming you didn’t get to talk about what might change between all of you if they take the cure?”

I didn’t think they’d be going anywhere near the cure. Especially now. But... “I did get to talk to Bennett about it. He seemed sure that this relationship was what he wanted. Exactly how it is.”

“Well that’s great.”

“Who really knows though, right? All their feelings could change if they take the cure. There’s no way to predict the future.”

“If only there was a supernatural creature that did that.”

We both laughed .

“Are you still nervous?” I asked. “About Callum taking the cure?”

“Yes. He seems so sure it will work though. His sureness makes me feel more comfortable. But then when I’m having trouble sleeping at night, all those doubts creep back in. God, I was really hoping for more information from Bennett’s contact. This sucks.”